Police Beating Renews Controversy Over Excessive Force

May 08, 2008 06:31 PM

by
findingDulcinea Staff

by Lindsey Chapman Six Philadelphia police officers have been removed from street duty following the beating of three shooting suspects. The incident raises concerns about police brutality and its underlying causes.

Around a dozen officers were part of the incident; it’s expected that more will be identified and reassigned to other duties.

The event has renewed controversy about the use of force by law officers, calling into question racial motives. Yet both Philadelphia’s mayor and police commissioner said race wasn’t an issue in this case. Just a few days earlier, Philadelphia police officer Sgt. Stephen Liczbinski was killed while on duty.

“When you consider the circumstances in Philadelphia over the last few days, coupled with officers’ heightened sense of safety for themselves, there is a need to rethink who is being deployed, for how long, and whether or not certain officers should even be responding to these kinds of situations at this time,” said Police Advisory Commission chairman Robert S. Nix.

The incident is part of a trend of increased police brutality since 9/11. James Pasco, executive director of the National Fraternal Order of Police, cautions critics, saying that despite the evidence of a trend, the number of brutality cases in the United States is still quite small.

The viral transmission of the video depicting the beating has fueled public outcry.

Officers in the Philadelphia police department have been under extreme “stress and pressure lately,” explained Police Commissioner Charles Ramsay. A Philadelphia police officer who was killed just a few days earlier became the third to die on duty in the last two years. Despite the “very high” emotions present right now, Ramsay said the officers should still “maintain a standard of conduct on the streets that is above reproach.”

The Police Advisory Commission, which serves to improve police-community relations, said it plans to monitor the investigation into the Philadelphia beating. It also plans to provide assistance for helping with officer deployment after shootings occur.

In 2006, Diop Kamau, a former police detective from Hawthorne, California, stated that police brutality was largely a racial issue. “I think that as African-Americans continue to be viewed and anticipated by police as violent and uncooperative with all of this negative stereotype associated with Black youth, those are going to be the principle victims.”

While Philadelphia’s Mayor Michael Nutter and Police Commissioner Charles Ramsey wouldn’t condone the officers’ behavior in the recent beating incident, they said it wasn’t race-related. “This is about proper police conduct, regardless of the race or ethnicity of the individuals involved,” said Nutter.

In 2007, ABC News reported about a medical condition, excited delirium, which is occasionally cited in instances where police brutality is alleged. Those who have it are said to exhibit erratic, violent behavior, particularly when in a stressful situation like police custody. It’s a controversial condition that some medical officials say is valid, however others wonder whether it’s an excuse used to justify the use of excessive force.

Brutality charges against police officers have been on the rise since 9/11 according to USA Today. The National Fraternal Order of Police is concerned that “reduced standards, training and promotion of less experienced officers into the higher ranks” could be part of the problem.

A December 2006 article from The Independent describes how a 23-year-old escaped a stolen goods charge, after a YouTube video caught the police using excessive force during his arrest. “It is growing ever harder to cover up public acts, either by spinning them or pretending they never happened, for the simple reason that at any moment those acts might be recorded and disseminated with little more than a USB plug-in and a few clicks of a mouse,” the paper reports.